I don’t like print media for one major reason – I cannot measure the response. With internet marketing, there are metrics I use to determine how advertising campaigns are working.  Click-throughs, referrals from specific sites, hits, time spent on a particular page – these are all methods by which I can measure whether my money is being used effectively to market my clients’ property. These metrics were paramount when I was evaluating a local magazine recently. I was simply not interested in their print arm, as nice as it is.

How is print effective? Branding. Marketing to the passive real estate consumer – those who may be looking in six, nine or eighteen months. A good example of this is the recent two-part series by the local Real Estate Weekly (PDF 1, PDF 2) – this type of feature article will do more than a 2×2 box that has a front shot of a house and a few clichéd words of description.

There is a survey out today validating my thoughts (and spurring this post).

Inman:

But Realtors say they buy print ads because their customers expect them to, not because they produce results, according to a survey by Florida-based Classified Intelligence LLC and Realty Times. … (bolding mine)

So what’s taking so long for the transition (to the internet) to happen?

“The difficulty is that many sellers value print advertising because they see it, they feel it, and they also feel that there is an investment that the agent is making in their listing with some forms of print advertising,”

Realty Times:

In allocating their budgets, Realtors get the word out on the street via flyers, yard signs, and billboards — still the top category of spending, as it was in 2005. Print advertising is a relatively modest portion of the pie. Thirty-six percent of respondents said that up to 10 percent of their advertising dollars go to newspaper advertising.

Thanks to Joel for the link to the study.

The only exception to this is Open Houses. The Sunday paper is the best way to get traffic to an open house.

Further reading:
I remain conflicted on this issue, however.
Is print dead?

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